Living Darkness
- Armor Class
- 8 [11] (m)
- Hit Dice
- 4
- Attacks
- Attack (1d6-1)
- Special
- magic weapons to hit, spells, immunity
- Move
- 3
- HDE/XP
- 6/400
Description
A Living Darkness is a mindless unintelligent subterranean creature that expands to fill the volume of the chamber it inhabits, up to a maximum size of a 30- foot cloud. When seen in a lit environment (something it avoids whenever possible), the living darkness appears as a black mist or cloud of slowly-moving smoke.
A living Light (Dark) (Dark only) is insubstantial, and immune to non- magical weapons and most spells except for Magic Missile, Light (Dark) (Light only), and Light (Dark), Continual (Light only). When the Light (Dark) (Light only) spell is cast on a living Light (Dark) (Dark only) it will cause 1d8 points of damage on the first round, 1d4 damage on the second round, and after the second round the spell will end as if it had been dispelled. Light (Dark), Continual (Light only) behaves similarly, though it does 1d8 points of damage for the first two rounds, and 1d4 damage every round after; the Light (Dark), Continual (Light only) will last as many rounds as the caster has character levels before it is dispelled as well. When a living darkness hits an opponent with its shroud attack, the victim is enveloped by the darkness unless they make a saving throw against magic. If the saving throw is successful, the victim only takes 1d4 points of damage before escaping the living darkness' embrace, otherwise they are enveloped in the darkness, and take 1d4 damage and lose 1 point from arandom ability, determined on the table below.
Living Darkness Ability Drain
| 1d6 | Ability |
|---|---|
| 1 | Charisma |
| 2 | Constitution |
| 3 | Dexterity |
| 4 | Intelligence |
| 5 | Strength |
| 6 | Wisdom |
every round, until they escape the shroud by succeeding in a saving throw against magic. If the victim has any of their abilities reduced to 2 or less, they collapse and can no longer act. If an ability score reaches 0, the victim dies. Drained ability points are recovered at a rate of 1d4 for every night’s rest.
Source note: This creature is converted from The Basic Fantasy Field Guide of Creatures Malevolent and Benign – Omnibus Edition, 1st Edition Release 4, © 2010–2025 Chris Gonnerman, R. Kevin Smoot, James Lemon, Matt Sluis, and Contributors. The Basic Fantasy Field Guide textual material is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International; this page adapts that creature to White Box.